1940-1942

1940

Frank Llewellyn Ballard, B.S., (July 1, 1940–September 10, 1941), appointed by the Oregon State Board of Higher Education as the eighth president of Oregon State College (the first graduate of Oregon State College to become president – Class of 1916) following the retirement of President Peavy. Ballard had a long career with the Oregon State College Extension Service. He served just over one year as president because of illness. Associate Director of Extension Service 1945–1961; Associate Director Emeritus 1961–1971.

Seafoods Laboratory facility established in Astoria.

Enrollment: 4,759.

Population in Corvallis: 8,392; in Benton County: 18,629; in Oregon: 1,089,684.

1941

Francois Archibald Gilfillan, B.S., Ph.G., Ph.C., Ph.D. (September 10, 1941–October 14, 1942), Dean of the School of Science, appointed acting president. Gilfillan's career at OSC spanned more than 60 years, as a student (B.S. in Pharmacy, 1918), Professor of Chemistry (1927-1939), Dean of Science (1939-1962), and Dean Emeritus (1962-1983).

Oregon Forest Products Laboratory established.

Library (now Kidder Hall) west wing addition completed.

Campus Gates dedicated on May 9.

Chuang Kwai Lui received her Ph.D. in physics, the first woman to receive a doctorate from Oregon State.

OSC's Japanese American students wrote a letter to President F.A. Gilfillan on December 11, 1941, to express their loyalty to the United States. Many of the students were relocated to internment camps in the region, while others joined and served in the military. In June 2008, the students received honorary degrees during the university’s 139th commencement ceremony at Reser Stadium.

1942

Major in Mining Engineering restored on January 27.

August Leroy Strand, B.S., M.S., Ph.D., LL.D. (October 15, 1942-August 22, 1961), appointed by the Oregon State Board of Higher Education as the ninth president of Oregon State College. Strand came to Oregon State College from Montana State College where he had been president for five years. President Emeritus, 1961-1980.

Pacific Coast Conference's 1941 football champion Oregon State College upset Duke 20-16 in the Rose Bowl, played on January 1, 1942 in Durham, North Carolina instead of Pasadena, California, because of the outbreak of war with Japan. It has been Oregon State's only Rose Bowl victory to date.

KOAC celebrated its enlargement to 5,000 watts of daytime service and twenty years on the air on October 16. A new transmitter building was completed at the college farm on the Corvallis-Albany highway (now U.S. 20).